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Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to BarkellWH)
Indeed El Cordobés indulged in a few hijinks which were criticized as disrespectful to the bulls, or to the corrida itself. In his own account of his first appearance at Las Ventas in Madrid, he attributed his serious injury to a lack of judgment, carried away by exhilaration at his first major success. He did not display the sobriety and reserve which gained Manolete such overwhelming admiration and respect. El Cordobés retired wealthy and intact, while Manolete was killed on the sand at the peak of his fame, acquiring an almost mythical status.
I would say it is more apt to call El Cordobés the protagonist of "..or I'll Dress You in Mourning," than to say he is its hero. The book is about more than the man. People who doubt the value of the corrida, or even those who oppose it, might find something of interest in it.
My copy was given to me by an American woman who runs a bed and breakfast in Oaxaca, Mexico. She is a leading expert on the local handicrafts and one of the founders of an organization that advocates for the artisans. We never discussed the corrida, but it would not surprise me if she opposed it.
On the other hand Ordoñez and Dominguín are the heroes of "The Dangerous Summer." For this to work, the reader must share Hemingway's point of view, at least to some extent. I did for years. To my surprise I found that I still sympathized with it emotionally as I watched Roca Rey in the Goyesca at Ronda in 2018. I enjoyed re-reading the book a couple of years ago.
But one who despises the corrida might find the book boring or even repellent, as I found the Goyesca itself to be in 2019, not on strictly philosophical grounds, but instead, due to its blatant corruption.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
I personally hate it, but won't try to politically force my opinions on others via laws. In the past it was a young idiot daring to stand on front of multiple bulls. Now it has become a sadistic theatre where the human always wins. Sick.
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to mrstwinkle)
quote:
In the past it was a young idiot daring to stand on front of multiple bulls.
The greatest matadors of the past, as well as some who might not have been the greatest but were "in the arena," to use Teddy Roosevelt's metaphor, hardly meet your definition of "young idiots." That you would call them such says a lot more about you than it does about the corrida and those who participated in it. At one time I was caught up in the excitement and enjoyment of the art, the ballet-like moves, and yes, courage, displayed in the corrida. Today, I would not attend one, but I would not cast aspersions on those who do or those who participate in them.
Again, as I commented above, I think it unwise and unproductive to argue the moral case for or against the corrida. It has been done several times in the past, and it has always ended badly. Unless we want this thread to be locked, it would be best to stick to the history, techniques, and great figures of the corrida.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
Dunno. A lot of people get injured every year, but deaths seem to be rare. Maybe because there's so much going on there's little chance a bull will focus on you specifically for all that long? I mean, if you stay down when you're down, maybe his attention is bound to get caught up elsewhere with so much going on? No idea.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Morante)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Morante
Pennsylvania is a long way from Pamplona. On the Internet, we should be tolerant of other cultures which we do not understand.
There’s no lack of tolerance here. Some commenters in this thread want people to believe these bulls represent a mortal threat to people. I’m disputing that.
Some commenters in this thread want people to believe these bulls represent a mortal threat to people. I’m disputing that.
BTW I’m not against bullfighting.
Having never been to Pamplona, nor having seen anything but brief video clips of this event, I couldn’t say.
However, your post prompts a few comments on the safety of confronting toros bravos in the ring.
Toreros, both novilleros and matadors have had years of training, or at least experience. Usually they begin with heifers, progress to yearlings and two-year olds. Finally they face mature bulls.
El Cordobés was so poor he couldn’t afford formal training, nor would he accept any employment except corridas at village fiestas in improvised rings. He and his buddy walked from village to village on dusty roads, and slept out of doors. Those were the only transportation and accommodation they could afford.
At the villages the bulls were usually undersized or sickly, though sometimes they were especially dangerous due to previous experience. To learn from mature healthy animals, El Cordobés and his friend trespassed upon ranches on moonlit nights and caped the bulls. This probably risked as much danger from the ranch people as it did from the bulls.
The torero can control risk through technique, but he cannot guarantee the outcome. He has considerable control over when the bull charges, and he can make the bull follow his cape or muleta with fair reliability, depending upon the particular animal. Thus he can influence the proximity of the bull’s horns to his body during a pass. But there is always uncertainty.
During his time in the ring, the bull begins to distinguish the cape from the torero. This was the source of serious injury to El Cordobés in his first appearance at Las Ventas. Intoxicated by the approval of the crowd, he extended the faena of the third tercio well beyond the warning signal indicating he should proceed to the kill. He continued to execute virtuosic passes until the bull learned where the man was relative to the muleta. The bull attacked the man, and El Cordobés was nearly killed.
The torero's job is to excite the crowd by a display of bravery and virtuosity in control of the bull. This means putting himself in danger, while still avoiding injury or death. He must not only train himself to control his natural tendency to retreat from the bull's charge, he must bring the bull close to himself as he passes. Self control, risk, and balletic skill with the cape, muleta and sword are the torero's tools to do his job.
Despite the toreros’ training and the relative predictability of bull behavior, I never knew the history of a full matador with a few years’ experience, who had not sustained one or more serious injuries.
However expert the torero’s knowledge and technique may be, if he does his job honestly he takes on enough risk to be in danger every time he steps into the ring with a bull.
I went to the Corrida Goyesca in 2018 intending to study the behavior of the crowd, in the hope of better understanding the persistence of the corrida in present day Spain, a very different country from the one I first visited 65 years ago. I had seen Spain's evolution into a more modern, more "European," more democratic, much more prosperous country during a number of visits over the years. Spain's cultural change had impacted flamenco. I wondered what its effect might have been upon the corrida.
I watched the crowd during the first bulls of the first two matadors, Morante de la Puebla and Cayetano Rivera Ordoñez, the grandson of Antonio Ordoñez. Cayetano's brother Francisco is empresario of the Goyesca.
Then, to my surprise, my emotions were engaged by Roca Rey’s performance, just as they would have been when I was in my thirties. He was absolutely cool under pressure. His feet were perfectly quiet. His back was straight. He passed the bull dangerously close. He walked away from each encounter with just the right degree of controlled swagger. During the tercio de varas with the big cape, he was thrown by the bull. He instantly sprang to his feet, and executed a pass linked to the previous one. The crowd roared.
Afterward, in the front courtyard at the Hotel Reina Victoria, Roca Rey stood with his manager and cuadrilla, welcoming handshakes and abrazos. He was still excited. The left shoulder of his jacket was torn down to the shallow gash in the skin. There was a llttle blood there and on his cheek.
That evening after supper there was a lively crowd in the hotel bar and in the back garden. The toreros mixed with the hotel guests.
Of course, any human activity that depends upon the integrity of its participants can be corrupted. In politics the spectrum spans from venality to treason. For the corrida the possibilities are more limited, but still plentiful. Corrida perpetrators usually escape legal consequences.
The corrida at Ronda in 2019 was a detestable swindle. Cayetano was in retirement--which turned out to be temporary. Roca Rey was disabled by an injury at the beginning of the season. He has recovered and performs spectacularly again.
The bulls’ horns were severely shaved. The animals were drugged to the point that they were not only sluggish, manso, and clumsy, one of them actually collapsed altogether during the third tercio.
Adding insult to injury, the two matadors behaved as shameless cowards.
In the old days at the Plaza Mexico the crowd would have reacted with violence. The toreros would have been lucky to escape without serious injury. Hemingway reported similar events in Spain with less provocation than occurred at Ronda in 2019.
In 2019 the criminals got clean away with it, without even a murmur from the crowd. I was both flaming mad at the cowardice and senseless slaughter, and mystified by the crowd.
That night at the hotel the attendance at the bar was sparse, there were few people in the garden. The toreros kept to their rooms. Larisa went downstairs to socialize. I sat on the balcony of our room sipping cognac, snacking on a small plate of almonds. I feared that if I went downstairs I would say something offensive.
Recent videos indicate that some toreros, including Roca Rey and Aguado still perform as they are meant to. At Ronda in 2018 and 2019, and in the videos the crowds contained very few younger people. However in Ronda during the two years we were there, numerous festively dressed young people appeared in the streets and outdoor cafes, and walked in the procession from the hotel to the plaza de toros.
The corrida persists in Spain, but is it in a state bordering on decadence? I am a little surprised at its continued, though diminished degree of popularity. I think it may be gone in another generation or two, perhaps even sooner.
But I have been seriously wrong about human behavior a few times in recent years.
I don't know about toros bravos in general outside of the ring, but I can assure you that many Santa Gertrudis bulls and at least one Longhorn have been mortal threats to both peope and horses. I've known a few dangerous cows, including one dairy cow that apparently meant to kill me. A few other bulls of my acquaintance have been peaceful. At least one was friendly after we knew one another for a week or so.
From personal experience I would caution people to be careful around bulls, at least until they are confident of the bulls' attitudes toward people.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
quote:
The corrida persists in Spain, but is it in a state bordering on decadence? I am a little surprised at its continued, though diminished degree of popularity. I think it may be gone in another generation or two, perhaps even sooner.
Possibly lost to the twiddling thumbs of video gamers. Who knows, maybe an immersive, virtual corrida will become popular in the future.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
quote:
Can someone explain to me why these people aren’t killed in droves every year at this event?
"These people" have Peñas and train all year. Training consists of running forward while looking back: they might hold a newspaper behind and keep looking at it. Also there are several sharp bends and the runners avoid the outside of the curve, where a toro might slide and crush you against the wall.
So it is not as haphazard as it looks: generally only half a dozen are hospitalized each time, mostly with contusions and only occasionally wounded by a horn.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Morante)
Not so much in Pamplona. Around half the runners there are foreigners. They don't come off as having prepared for anything. They're mostly there to get drunk and make bad decisions, one of which is running in an event they are entirely unprepared for.
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Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
quote:
Can someone explain to me why these people aren’t killed in droves every year at this event? Photos: Running of the Bulls
In 1965, while serving in the U.S. Air Force in Germany, I spent one month (straddling July/August) on leave, two weeks of which were in Spain, I spent the entire first week (July 7-14) in Pamplona at the Fiesta de San Fermin, attending the festivities, watching the corrida, and each morning at 8:00am watching the running of the bulls. While many of the runners were young men of Navarre (the province of which Pamplona is the capital), even then, as Piwin noted above, more than half were drunken Americans and Europeans.
I did not participate in the running of the bulls, and I have no insight into the "psychology" of the bulls, but I would hazard a guess in answer to your question above. Normally, in a corrida, in the third segment ("tercio," as they are called in Spanish, after the work of the picador on horseback and the banderillero's placement of the banderillas) the bull faces a lone "target," so to speak, the Matador. The bull's concentration is directed toward the matador. During the running of the bulls, on the other hand, the bulls are on a "directed" stampede, and the crowd of runners ahead of them is diffuse. There is no single "target" to concentrate on and it all probably appears confusing (for lack of a better term) to the bull. Thus, with exceptions, the runners who manage to maintain speed and agility are able to escape unscathed.
After the week at the Fiesta in Pamplona, I went to Madrid for a week, much of which was spent wandering around in the Prado, one of the great museums of the world. I ended my leave with ten days in Nice, France, thus fulfilling my goal of swimming in the Mediterranean (although the beach at Nice is composed of small stones and pebbles, not sand). Also visited Monte Carlo, where Jacques Cousteau based himself, and San Remo on the Italian Riviera. All in all, a marvelous experience for a young guy who grew up in Arizona.
It may be of interest to those unaware of it that the great Sabicas was born in Pamplona.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Piwin)
Well, we have Canal toros on TV, so have all the corridas of the año, repeated so that we can go out for tapas and return to see the corrida del día. I was persuaded to live in Spain by los toros, flamenco came later when I realised the close conection between toros and flamenco. Last night, Caracolillo sang a whole bulerías with letras en homenaje de toros.
This thread should stop because of the clash of cultures. This is my last post on the subject.
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Morante)
quote:
This thread should stop because of the clash of cultures. This is my last post on the subject.
There is no "clash of cultures" on this thread. You are the only one who tries to appear as if you are defending the corrida when there has been nothing said to defend against. We have been discussing the popularity (or its diminishment) of the corrida, the techniques and great names associated with the corrida, and the running of the bulls in Pamplona. No one has disparaged the corrida or its participants.
On several occasions you have tried to manufacture an implied bias against the corrida among posters on this thread where none exists. No need to "stop" this thread. Nevertheless, perhaps it's best that this was your last post on the subject. The rest of us can continue the discussion without your criticism of a perceived bias that exists only in your imagination.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to BarkellWH)
quote:
ORIGINAL: BarkellWH
quote:
This thread should stop because of the clash of cultures. This is my last post on the subject.
There is no "clash of cultures" on this thread. You are the only one who tries to appear as if you are defending the corrida when there has been nothing said to defend against. We have been discussing the popularity (or its diminishment) of the corrida, the techniques and great names associated with the corrida, and the running of the bulls in Pamplona. No one has disparaged the corrida or its participants.
On several occasions you have tried to manufacture an implied bias against the corrida among posters on this thread where none exists. No need to "stop" this thread. Nevertheless, perhaps it's best that this was your last post on the subject. The rest of us can continue the discussion without your criticism of a perceived bias that exists only in your imagination.
Bill
Well put. He keeps trying to bait people. Hopefully he’ll give up after his last comment.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to BarkellWH)
quote:
There is no single "target" to concentrate on and it all probably appears confusing (for lack of a better term) to the bull
That's what I had in mind as well. That, and maybe the fact that there are several bulls together (as opposed to a lone bull in the arena) impacts their behavior? Dunno.
@Pgh
quote:
Possibly lost to the twiddling thumbs of video gamers. Who knows, maybe an immersive, virtual corrida will become popular in the future.
Now I'm imagining a steampunk bull equipped with circular saw, homing missiles and laser beams.
There's a spot in the nearby park where I go to read sometimes. The kids (not sure exactly how old, but seemingly mid to late teens) from the local school of bullfighting often practise there. They have this contraption, a kind a two-wheeled cart with horns on it. One of them pushes it around, simulating the bull, while the other practises his moves with the cape. Sometimes the one simulating the bull will just take the horns, place them over his head and run with it. When they take a break, I'll sometimes overhear their conversations. It's mostly what you would expect from Spanish boys today: soccer, TV shows, video games, girls and school stuff. Their passion for bullfighting seems to coexist well enough with the more common interests of boys their age.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Piwin)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Piwin There's a spot in the nearby park where I go to read sometimes. The kids (not sure exactly how old, but seemingly mid to late teens) from the local school of bullfighting often practise there. They have this contraption, a kind a two-wheeled cart with horns on it. One of them pushes it around, simulating the bull, while the other practises his moves with the cape. Sometimes the one simulating the bull will just take the horns, place them over his head and run with it. When they take a break, I'll sometimes overhear their conversations. It's mostly what you would expect from Spanish boys today: soccer, TV shows, video games, girls and school stuff. Their passion for bullfighting seems to coexist well enough with the more common interests of boys their age.
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
Venta del Batán, in the outskirts of Madrid. They have corrals and a small arena, but it's always empty, I believe mostly due to politics. On the weekends its parking lot fills up with people going to the amusement park across the street. During the week, the immediate area around the venta is known for prostitution. It's not exactly the beating heart of Spanish bullfighting...
The school had officially relocated downtown to Plaza de las Ventas and it only just recently returned to Batán. Students were still regularly practising in the park nearby even while the school was downtown. Not entirely sure why tbh. Well, Plaza de las Ventas owns the place so maybe they were just using it as a kind of unofficial branch. Dunno. Just last month they had some bulls corralled there, for the first time in 20 years or so, so maybe the place has been given a new lease of life.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: Bullfighting Festival in Colombia (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
That's interesting to see. I think it was last December when they announced the school was returning, so there should be more going on there since then. Though on the corral side, which is where I usually walk, it still looks abandoned. Or at least it did last time I went, which would've been early June I believe.
These pictures look a lot more like what I saw then:
There has been the occasional event there in the years I've been here, but it doesn't seem to be all that frequent. An elderly neighbor who is quite the aficionado told me that Batán is where they used to corral the bulls in the days or weeks before the fights at Plaza de las Ventas and some other main arenas in the region. But ganaderos are now reluctant to go back to this system because they don't like the idea of having to transport their bulls twice, once to Madrid, and another time to the arena, which would be tiring for the bulls. That was his explanation anyway.
edit: here you can see them doing the kind of practice I'd see them do in the park. Looks like my memory is playing tricks on me though, since I remember that contraption as having two wheels instead of one, and I don't remember it having the entire bull head represented on top.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
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